International financial crises have plagued the world
in recent decades, including the Latin American debt
crisis of the 1980s, the East Asian crisis of the late
twentieth century, and the global financial crisis of
2007-09. One of the basic problems faced during these
crises is the lack of adequate preventive mechanisms, as
well as insufficient instruments to finance countries in
crisis and to overcome their over-indebtedness.
Resetting the International Monetary (Non)System
provides an analysis of the global monetary system and
the necessary reforms that it should undergo to play an
active role in the twenty-first century and proposes a
comprehensive yet evolutionary reform of the system.
Criticising the ad hoc framework- a "(non)system"-
that has evolved following the breakdown of the Bretton
Woods arrangement in the early 1970's, Resetting the
International Monetary (Non)System places a special
focus on the asymmetries that emerging and developing
countries face, analysing the controversial management
of crises by the International Monetary Fund and
proposing a consistent set of reform proposals to design
a better system of international monetary cooperation.
Policy orientated and structured to deal in a sequential
way with the issues involved, it suggests provision of
international liquidity through a system that mixes the
multicurrency arrangement with a more active use of the
IMF's Special Drawing Rights; stronger mechanisms of
macroeconomic policy cooperation, including greater
cooperation in exchange rate management and freedom to
manage capital flows; additional automatic
balance-of-payments financing facilities and the
complementary use of swap and regional arrangements; a
multilateral sovereign debt workout mechanism; and major
reforms of the system's governance.

About Me

As a kid I liked numbers and the sound of strings. I considered studying engineering but chose social sciences because of my interest in people. I combine a theoretical interest with a practical, social approach which brought me to the sphere of policy research. I am interested in reducing the disparity between poor and rich, between the powerful and the less powerful.
In 1973 and 1982 I lived in Latin America. In the mid-1980s, I was able to create an international forum to discuss the functioning of the international monetary system and the debt crisis, the Forum on Debt and Development (FONDAD). I established it with the view that the debt crisis of the 1980s was a symptom of a malfunctioning, flawed global monetary and financial system.
I was one of the driving forces behind the creation of the European Network on Debt and Development that was established at the end of the 1980s to help put pressure on European policymakers.
In 1990, before the beginning of the Gulf War, I cofounded the Golfgroep, a discussion group about international politics comprising journalists, scientists, politicians and activists that meets regularly.
The website of FONDAD is www.fondad.org